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FBI hunts for Trump gunman’s motive

US authorities are hunting for a motive for the apparent assassination attempt on former President Donald Trump on Saturday. Officials said the gunman, a 20-year-old Pennsylvania man who was killed by Secret Service, shot at Trump from a roof outside the venue, grazing his ear. The shooting, which killed one rally-goer and left two others critically injured, raised immediate questions about how anyone was able to fire at Trump given the layers of protection that surround such appearances. President Joe Biden ordered a review of the event’s security, saying “an assassination attempt is contrary to everything we stand for as a nation.” Trump called for national unity in the face of “evil.”

Attack sends shocks through 2024 race

The assassination attempt threatens to thrust the US into a new era of political turmoil defined by violence. The temperature was high ahead of Saturday, but now the election is “considerably more fraught than before,” the Financial Times’ US politics editor wrote. “Violence was already implicit in much of the rhetoric. Now it is explicit.” Analysts were quick to surmise that the shooting could boost Trump’s campaign for the White House, while offering a reprieve to the scrutiny surrounding Biden’s candidacy. A widely shared photo of Trump being rushed offstage, his face bloodied under an American flag and pumping his fist, will be the defining image of Trump’s campaign and political career, Politico wrote: “Symbolism is often more significant than substance.”

World reacts to Trump shooting

World leaders condemned the attack on Trump, but some also asked questions — and fielded conspiracies — about American democracy. Even those who have sparred with the former president, like Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro, denounced the violence. On Chinese platform WeChat, speculation abounded about the gunman’s motives, while the top comment on a post by the state-run People’s Daily amplified the phrase, “America the free, every day a shooting.” Russia blamed Biden’s administration for fostering an environment that “provoked” the attack, adding that the US’ use of “force” internationally had “spilled inside the country.” But it’s a global issue: In 2024 alone, there have been several political assassination attempts and attacks in Latin America, Asia, and Europe.

Major China economy meeting begins

Chinese leaders meet this week to set the country’s economic agenda for the next few years. The third plenary session, beginning Monday, will take place behind closed doors and under the shadow of a soaring youth unemployment rate and low business confidence. The meeting could bring some relief to the private sector by cutting limits on foreign investments and alleviating real estate oversupply, but forecasters cautioned there may be no dramatic changes to the status quo. The country’s premier, Li Qiang, recently compared China’s economy to a sick patient, adding that, “according to Chinese medical theory… we cannot use strong medicine.” This comment was censored in China’s media, however, and Xi Jinping has signaled he favors removing red tape to encourage “new quality productive forces.”

HK making its own ChatGPT

The Hong Kong government is making its own version of ChatGPT, after OpenAI restricted access to the popular chatbot. The move comes as the competition for dominance in artificial intelligence heats up between Washington and Beijing. The US-based startup blocked developers in Hong Kong and mainland China last week from using the bot’s underlying technology to power their own applications. The “Hong Kong version of ChatGPT” will be used across all government departments by the end of 2024 and could eventually be made public, the city’s technology minister said. Meanwhile, Chinese state media said the decision to cut off ChatGPT access boosts the country’s self-reliance in AI development.

Syrians vote in ‘rigged’ elections

Syrians in government-controlled areas are set to vote Monday in elections designed to keep President Bashar al-Assad’s party in power. The Baath Party and its allies are running virtually unopposed, and Syrians who live abroad or in Kurdish-controlled regions aren’t able to vote. “Historically, Syrian elections are rigged, and this election is no different,” Atlantic Council experts wrote. It will be the country’s sixth vote since a 2015 United Nations resolution laid out a roadmap for free and fair elections in the country, but no real progress has been made. One core issue: The country doesn’t have an accurate voter list or reliable information about the size and makeup of the electorate.

Women disappearing from tech

Women are seemingly vanishing from tech, The Information’s founder and CEO Jessica Lessin wrote. Startups with at least one woman co-founder got just 16.6% of all the venture capital dollars invested so far this year, a drop from 27% last year, according to Pitchbook, while organizations like Women Who Code and Girls in Tech have shut down. Lessin attributed the change to a societal backlash to diversity initiatives across the industry: “After years of cost cutting that have put tech employees on edge, companies and their leaders are facing less pressure from their teams to hire more-diverse candidates, and so they are taking shortcuts and going with the safe choice.”

Quantum computer sets accuracy record

A quantum computer made by a UK-based startup smashed a record for the accuracy of its calculations previously set by Google. These systems use entangled subatomic particles to do calculations, but their building blocks, “qubits,” are error-prone. The largest quantum computers currently have 1,000, but startup Quantinuum uses just 56 and is focused on minimizing their error. In their computer, each qubit went wrong just 0.02% of the time, meaning its calculations were error-free 35% of the time — up from Google’s Sycamore computer’s 0.2%, an increase of 100 fold. There’s still a long way to go: For the million-plus-qubit machines needed to do real work, each qubit can only experience an error no more than about one time in a trillion.

Voice box transplant a medical first

A cancer patient had their voice restored after a total larynx, or voice box, transplant in what may be a medical first. A complete voice box transplant has been carried out previously on people who lost theirs due to injury, but previously not in people with cancer, even though the disease is by far the biggest cause of larynx removal. In a 21-hour operation, doctors replaced a man’s larynx, esophagus, and parts of his throat, and he can now talk, and swallow, for the first time in years. He told The Associated Press that he phoned his 82-year-old mother after the surgery, “and she could hear me... That was important to me, to talk to my mother.”

‘Space Coast’ set for rocket launch record

Florida’s “Space Coast” is on track for a record number of rocket launches this year, after the 50th rocket took off from the region last week. Most of the uptick is due to Elon Musk’s company, with SpaceX responsible for 47 of the 50 rocket launches from Cape Canaveral or the nearby Kennedy Space Center (the other three belonged to United Launch Alliance). The region could see 100 launches this year, beating its record of 72 set in 2023. Worldwide, launches are increasing rapidly: The average between 2008 and 2017 was 82, but since has shot up to 133. It’s a sign of the growth of the commercial space industry — SpaceX alone plans to launch 144 times this year.

July 15:

• The Republican National Convention begins in Wisconsin where Donald Trump plans to speak.
• Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu convenes a cabinet meeting.
• The US Food and Drug Administration is set to decide whether to approve Orexo AB’s nasal spray to treat drug overdoses.

The latest installment in a Hindi-language TV crime drama about a carpet exporter and mob boss is proving a hit with Indian viewers despite middling reviews. The third season of Mirzapur, released earlier this month, became the most-watched show on Prime Video in India, the streaming platform said. The show follows a millionaire gangster and his ambitious son who wants to inherit his father’s legacy. But despite breaking viewing records, this season of the show got worse reviews than the first two. The Hindustan Times noted that this season is more gory and lacking in story: It’s “all about the fizz and no rizz.”

• Democrats are putting politics aside for now. It can’t last forever.
• A key Democrat warns the Biden debate must end before the RNC does.
• UK universities want millions from new government for startups hatched in academia.